


Strangers Till Now

by musicallife17



Category: Labyrinth (1986)
Genre: Calm Before The Storm, Drama, F/M, Family, Getting to know you, Post-Canon, Redemption, Romance, Second Chances, Slow Burn, character backstory, life after the labyrinth
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-29
Updated: 2017-03-28
Packaged: 2018-10-12 03:21:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10480959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musicallife17/pseuds/musicallife17
Summary: She had won fair and square. She had the right to have the life she knows she could have, while holding onto her memories and her friends from her past. It's time to put that part of her life behind her - to put him in the past where he belongs. But when Sarah tries to move on, her mind can't seem to keep that part of her life away. How can she know anything of a future in her own world, when her soul is still stuck somewhere else? Why is she thinking of him, and why does she second guess everything she thought she ever knew about him?But what Sarah is unaware of, is that she is part of something far greater than simply beating the Goblin King at his own game. Something that is slowly unraveling before the kingdom's very eyes.





	

**Author's Note:**

> A total reworking of a story I started years ago and have decided to flesh out completely. There was so much more that I wanted to add to this chapter, but have decided it would be a nice little intro to the story and will continue on next chapter. More of Sarah's life following the Labyrinth will be looked at later. All thoughts and comments are greatly appreciated.

It was considered to be an unspoken law. Once night fell and the house was quiet, and there was nothing to do but sleep, the mind was free to slow down and recover from what was usually a long and trying day, as could only be the best way of describing a day of controlling a human being.

She was tossing and turning again. Tangled up in her bed sheets she fought against the ghosts in her mind that seemed to be standing between her and peaceful rest.

The mind, while powerful, is a curious thing. It is the centre of all logic, thought and reason, as well as the imagination. It is the means of judgement, deciphering right from wrong and, perhaps most important of all, memory. But at night, it was permitted rest, given time to recover and do the same thing all over again the very next day.

Unfortunately, Sarah could not be granted such a reprieve.

She woke with a start, her chest was heaving as though she had been running a marathon, instead of just dreaming like a normal human being. Sarah lay on her back, staring up at her bedroom ceiling, allowing a moment for her eyes to adjust to the lack of light. The only source was a sliver coming from the moon just beyond her curtains, outside her window.

It was a common symptom of an overactive imagination, she was told. Many nights were spent sitting up late, or laying in bed, trying to sleep, but the images in her mind simply didn’t want to cooperate. It was times like these she would visit with one of her friends. The knowing comfort of a short visit would usually put her mind at ease. Though lately, things had been getting considerably worse. She would go to bed of an evening, feeling as though nothing was wrong, only to spend hours during the night fighting unseen ghosts from her past. Come morning, Sarah could not think of a reason behind it.

The downstairs clock had long since rung past twelve. There was no reason for her mind to still be working as hard as it was. While the rest of the household slept peacefully in their bed, no doubt dreaming effortlessly, Sarah appeared to have missed out on that luxury. It was not for lack of trying, mind you.

_How you turn my world you precious thing..._

At eighteen, she was used to sleepless nights, hunched over her desk until ungodly hours of the morning, studying for whatever exam that threatened to determine the course of her future for the rest of her life. However, this was different. It wasn’t a nightmare, those were something she could handle, however infrequent they were. This was something far worse. These were her memories.

But it wasn’t her memories of the Labyrinth that were the problem. The Labyrinth, though difficult at the time of running it, wasn’t at all harmful to her. It was the one who ruled over it, seemingly with an iron fist.

She knew that voice, deep down she knew she would be able to hear it for the rest of her life, no matter how badly she tried to force herself to forget it. It had been quiet for years, but somehow had managed to sneak its way back into her subconscious, for whatever reason it desired.

_Look at what I’m offering you..._

Sarah sighed, running her hand through her hair as she turned her head and looked to the clock on her bedside table. Peering in the darkness, she saw that it was only three in the morning. Groaning to herself, Sarah fell back against her pillows and closed her eyes, though she knew it would be a while yet for sleep to come.

It had been years since she had been plagued with dreams like these. Instead of sleeping and taking advantage of the chance to rest, her mind was working in overdrive, dredging up memories of a time she was determined to stay in the past. Thirteen hours that had, quite literally, turned her entire world upside down.

Initially, Sarah was almost convinced that it had been nothing but a dream, something fantastical that her mind had created out of boredom or anger at her parents and her baby brother. One too many stories running rampant in her head, as her father often told her. But Sarah knew that even she couldn’t have come up with something that frightening and wonderful all at once. There were memories that were simply far too real to be anything but, and Sarah took some level of comfort in that. the added evidence of a party and her friends being present was also a realistic factor that she couldn’t simply ignore.

But one thing was for certain, upon her return to her own world, Sarah Williams had changed.

The selfish and naive fifteen year old was gone, lost somewhere in the ruins of the Goblin City, and a confident and sure young woman rose to take her place, like a phoenix rising from the ashes; a young girl realising just how blind she had been. 

In the years since her adventure in the Labyrinth, Sarah realized that it was a too big a part of her to ignore. So she embraced it, and allowed herself to think of it often. Her friends, who she loved dearly, and still visited her every chance they could through her vanity mirror, and allowed her to vent of her day, doing the same of theirs in return.

But she never thought of him.

That was one particular area of her mind where she didn’t dare go. In the beginning, it wasn’t out of fear or remembering what he had done to her. That was something that she could look past, if only for the sake of moving on. In the words of him, ‘what’s said is said’, and what’s done was done. There was nothing Sarah or even he could do to change it.

So why now was he able to plague her thoughts?

Sarah was sure it wasn’t by his doing. He made it rather clear the affect the words had on him, and she could not forget the look he had given her as everything began to crumble and she was sent home. But it wasn’t intentional either. Sarah never went out of her way to pay him any thought at all, yet here she was, lying in bed, unable to shake the sound of his voice from her mind.

_Everything that you have wanted I have done..._

Knowing it was useless, Sarah pulled the covers back and moved to sit up in bed. She let out a light gasp as her feet touched the cold wooden floor beneath her. The house was silent, as it should at three in the morning. In a few hours, her father would be up getting ready for work, and her stepmother would be cooking Toby breakfast while he played with his toys. The picture of domestic perfection. Sarah often wondered if that would still have been the case if she lost.

Pulling herself from the bed, Sarah wandered over to her window and looked out at the night before her. There were times when she was younger, that she was sure she had seen an owl sitting on a branch on the tree outside her window. But these days, it was hard to decipher fantasy from reality, even in the most simplest of things.

“Get it together, Sarah.” She murmured, rubbing her eyes tiredly. It was just her head, she was thinking about the labyrinth, she was thinking of him...of course it would bring up memories. She hadn’t thought of him in three years, let alone mentioned his name. But now that the gates had opened, so to speak, Sarah feared that she could think of nothing but.

A thought crossed her mind, and Sarah found herself glancing over her shoulder at her vanity dresser. Biting her lip, she considered bringing it out, if only for a moment’s piece of mind. It couldn’t do any arm, right? It was an inanimate object, and undoubtedly a rather dusty one at that. perhaps once upon a time it would have been able to leave some form of destruction in its wake, but it had been nothing but dormant since that night, just another one of her fairy tales that she had put away.

Sighing once more, she moved across the room and pulled the draw open. Sifting through papers and trinkets from her childhood, she finally found it buried underneath. A familiar red leather bound book.

A small smile graced Sarah’s lips as she pulled it out of the drawer. Her fingers almost pulsed as she ran her fingertip along the gold lettering printed on the cover. She hadn’t even looked at it since she put it away all those years ago, a rather fitting ending to a closing chapter in her life. It was strange, how a small book like this could have been the cause of something so incredibly huge.

She wasn’t entirely sure what possessed her to do so, but Sarah found herself opening it. There was no doubt in her mind that she still had the thing memorized, as she opened the cover to a random place in the book. Though she barely had a chance to glance at the words as she felt something light hit her foot

Glancing down, Sarah noticed an envelope resting by her feet. Seeing it lying there, she couldn’t help feel a small pang of recollection, though she wasn’t entirely sure why. Hesitating only just, she bent down to pick it up, looking at it curiously. The book had preserved it well, the stationary still white and crisp. There was nothing written on the front, and for a moment Sarah almost dismissed it as nothing but a placeholder in her book. But why that particular book?

Feeling awakened for the first time in years, Sarah’s curiosity got the better of her as she closed the book, holding it under her arm as she moved back over to her bed, perching on the edge as she pried open the envelope, pulling out whatever was inside.

The sight she was met with gave her both reason to smile and reason to fear. She had forgotten about this. There had been so much going on that night that she hadn’t realized she had left it. Her hand writing had changed somewhat over the last three years; growing more confident and precise with each word, but there was no denying it was hers. Apparently fifteen year old Sarah had found the courage to pen his majesty a letter, letting him have it about the events of that very evening. 

Sarah had to bite back a smile, remembering the young, rather petulant version of herself. God, she had been so naive, barely understanding her own world let alone another completely foreign one. But she was young, and had been thrown into a rather difficult situation. She did what she had to do, or at least that was what she convinced herself of.

She let the book and letter fall onto the covers of her bed. This had been a bad idea, awakening the past at this time of night. She thought she had been over thinking things before, but that could hardly be compared to now. The events of those thirteen hours played over in her mind, as vibrant and strange as they had been three years ago.

A loud ringing from downstairs pulled Sarah out of her thoughts with a shock. For a moment, she thought she was back there, but quickly and thankfully realized it was just the downstairs clock striking four. She rubbed her eyes; it was far too late to let him occupy her thoughts any longer. If she kept this up, she was likely to drive herself insane.

Putting the book and the letter to the floor by her bed, Sarah pulled the covers around her once more, settling down in bed. She closed her eyes and tried to go back to sleep. Perhaps in the morning she could logically sift through her thoughts, or better yet, have him leave her mind completely. Something told her that that wouldn’t be as easy as it seemed.

oOoOoOoOoOo

Sarah was up and out of bed again by nine the next morning. It was a habit; she had been groomed to be an early riser since high school and that didn’t seem to change in the months following her graduation. She completely bypassed her mirror that morning, not wanting to see how hellish she looked after five hours sleep. Instead she quickly ran a brush threw her hair and pulled her hair up before she headed downstairs.

Her stepmother was at the stove with her back to her, cooking something that was filling the entire kitchen with an incredible smell. Though their relationship was still rocky at times, Sarah would be lying if she said it was the same as it had been.  While she knew that she and Irene would never be the best of friends, nor would they want to be, there was no point in wasting time arguing over the trivial. Her newfound appreciation for what she had been given in life and her new maturity gave her cause to see that resenting her stepmother and their constant fighting were doing nothing to benefit anyone.

So, Sarah was the bigger man, so to speak, and began treating Irene with the kindness that she deserved. While the woman was surprised at her stepdaughter’s rapid change in behaviour, she wasn’t going to question it. So while she constantly asked about Sarah’s plans now that she was out of high school, asking whether she went on any more dates this weekend, Irene had learned to accept the eccentricities that came with having Sarah in her life.

Toby was sitting in his booster seat at the table, happily playing with a couple of plastic dinosaur toys he had been given for his last birthday. That was the latest craze for the three year old, dinosaurs and dragons and all manner of wild beasts. Sarah often wondered just what Toby would make of Ludo if he ever had the chance to meet him.

“Morn’ Sawah.” Toby greeted, beaming up at her when he noticed her lingering in the hallway. Sarah smiled and made her way further into the kitchen. He had grown up so quickly, now four years old and the happiest little boy she could have ever known. Toby was doted upon by his parents, but was not a spoiled or ungrateful child. But as much as his parents adored him, Sarah felt at times it could hardly measure to the relationship they had a siblings. She knew the irony was plain as anything, but spent little time worrying about it. After all, she had won.

“Morning munchkin.” She smiled, reaching out and ruffling his hair playfully. The boy giggled and swatted her hand away with a plastic pterodactyl as Irene came over with a cup of coffee.

“Couldn’t sleep again?” she asked knowingly, handing Sarah the cup. She smiled softly in thanks and shrugged in reply.

“Yeah, not too bad though. I managed to fall asleep again pretty quickly.” Sarah replied. She decided it would be best to leave out the part of her reminiscing about the king of the goblins who kidnapped her son when he was a baby.

“Well, you’ll have the house to yourself for the rest of the weekend. If you don’t have plans perhaps you could catch up on some rest then?” Irene suggested. Sarah had almost forgotten that her parents and Toby were going to visit Irene’s parents for the weekend. They had offered her to go with them, but she politely declined, preferring a little quiet time without a rather loud and excitable three year old around the house, which her parents completely understood.

Sarah sat down at the table, and Toby instantly started showing off the dinosaurs that were currently eating breakfast with him. She smiled as she listened intently, although her mind was completely elsewhere. He was so animated; everything was still new and exciting for him. His eyes still full of wonder when he discovered something new and magical. How could she have wanted him to be taken away?

oOoOoOoOoOo

It had taken roughly half an hour to convince both her father and Irene that she would be fine for the weekend on her own, and an extra twenty minutes or so to get them into the car. Sarah assured them that she had every contact number that they could have given her, and that she wouldn’t spend the entire weekend cooped up on her own. She could invite one of her friends over if she wanted to, and she promised that she would at least entertain the idea for a little while. Sarah let out a huffed sigh of relief when the car drove down the street, slowly growing smaller until it was completely out of sight.

With her family headed off for the weekend, and a house to herself, Sarah was quite relaxed. She had spent the afternoon doing housework and tidying up, followed some baking and a few other tasks she rarely got to do without interruption from her little brother. She loved Toby to death, but she didn’t think it was at all selfish to enjoy some time without playing dinosaurs.

The weather had gone from sunny to a cloudy and rainy afternoon, which kept her inside for the rest of the day, not that she minded at all. When there had been little else to occupy her time, Sarah moved to the couch with a small pile of books by her side and Merlin curled up fast asleep on the floor by her feet. It was relaxing, but the lack of background noise she had grown accustomed to seemed to make it harder for her to focus on the words on the page.

Too often she found herself rereading the same sentence over and over when her mind seemed to drift away, going back to the night before. Sarah had read the same paragraph several times before she gave up, closing her book and putting it back on the table, moving to shift through her pile until she found the little red book.

She sat a while, just staring at the cover, simple and unassuming upon initial glance. It was rather hard to believe that there was a time when it really was nothing but a story that she used to read lines from in the park.

None of this was making any sense. She had been content in her memories of the Labyrinth, the feeling that she had when she knew she had succeeded and brought her brother home safely. She had her friends and she had an image of him, one that she was fine with never thinking of again.

So why now? Why couldn’t her mind be content in keeping it how she remembered, however childish it would seem. It was simple that way; hero and villain, friends who helped her along the way. Couldn’t it just be left at that? Apparently Sarah’s inner mind had other ideas. Growing older meant learning and developing understandings of the world around you. It seemed as though that meant recalling memories and realizing that perhaps they weren’t as two dimensional or straight cut as she had initially thought.

She hated that this had consumed her mind all of a sudden and without any explanation whatsoever. What made it worse was that since he was at the centre of it all. He had no power over her and yet for whatever reason, Sarah couldn’t shake him from her thoughts. She could only imagine the look on his face if he knew. She could see him, as plainly as if he were standing before her here and now.

The Goblin King.

She remembered first laying eyes on him, standing tall and proud, positively roguish by her window. He stood with every ounce of grandeur that a king would, cloak billowing in the winds of his arrival. She could still see the smug expression on his features. He found it funny, perhaps, that she was so sure they were merely words and not an incantation to summon him. He looked every bit a fairy tale villain would.

Every fairy tale needed a villain. If she was the hero, that meant was the villain in her story. He had taken her brother and given her an almost impossible task to get him back, all the while doing everything in his power to make sure she didn’t succeed. He had wanted her to fail. But why?

_I have been generous up until now..._

They had never met before she wished Toby away. The only reason she even know of his existence was because of the book. There had really been no reason for him to want to see her lose other than the fact that her winning meant he wouldn’t. If he won, he would gain a new subject in his kingdom, according to him. If he lost, he would have lost to a child, beaten at his own game.

‘This is ridiculous.’ Sarah thought to herself, shaking her head in hopes to free her mind of such things. All of that was in the past; it didn’t need to be thought of again. She would never need to think about him or anything to do with him ever again.

“I wish...” she murmured, letting her head rest in her hands, a soft sigh escaping her lips. “I wish I could let this go.”

 


End file.
